Assessment and plan for organizational culture change at nasa

LDR 535 Collaboration Warm-Up Exercise: Organizational Culture Overview
Slide 1
Title: Collaboration Warm-Up Exercise: Assessing NASA's Safety Culture and the Central Role of Collaboration in Facilitating Relevant Organizational Change
Slide 2
Title: Exercise Objectives
Assess an organization’s culture.

Align an organization’s culture to reflect the organization’s mission, values, and strategies.

Slide 3
Title: Challenge
In this warm-up, you will assess NASA’s culture in terms of its readiness for change by reviewing the required module readings module, and the case study and cultural readiness assessment provided in this warm-up exercise.

Slide 4
Title: Assessing an organization’s culture for change readiness
Learning to assess the various aspects that influence each organization’s climate and culture and the organization’s ability to undergo positive change, will enable you to

formulate plans to implement, support, and facilitate organizational change. Aspects that influence organizational climate and culture include leadership styles, human behavior, persuasion, negotiation and conflict management competencies, diversity, and understanding the change process.

Download: Cultural Change Prerequisites Handout

Download Link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HPW1DxT03zvYnv210MloOoPM9um6C63d/view?usp=sharing

Download: Cultural Change Assessment Handout

Download Link:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1E6KaGnel-ay5pIwA8ZZz3a-40_kdKzH-/view?usp=sharing

Slide 5
Title: NASA Overview and Organizational Culture
In 2003, seven NASA crew members aboard Space Shuttle Columbia were killed when the shuttle disintegrated upon re-entering Earth’s atmosphere. This triggered an investigation into the cause of the accident.

The investigation revealed three main issues:

1. Systematic safety cultural and organizational problems including decision making, risk management, and communication.

2. Inadequate or insufficient requirements for returning safely to earth.

3. A need to foster technical excellence.

As a result, NASA’s objective was to transform its organizational and safety culture, and create a climate and culture focused on safety.

Slide 6
Title: Assessing NASA’s current culture
The first step in developing and implementing the change plan was to assess NASA’s current safety culture and norms, and specifically those aspects that did not support the adoption of the required changes.

This allowed NASA to develop courses of actions that promoted behavioral changes and introduce new norms that:

1. Eradicated barriers to a safety mindset and culture.

2. Promoted collaboration, alignment, and integration of NASA’s workforce and its support of a strong safety culture.

Slide 7
Title: Assessing NASA’s Current Culture
Why was the first step to creating the desired change to assess the current organizational culture?

[Student Entry]

[Following student responses:]

The current organizational culture needed to be assessed to understand how the workforce’s dominant unstated, shared values and beliefs were influencing their behaviors and functioning.

Slide 8
Title: Assessing NASA’s Current Culture
Feedback

The current organizational culture needs to be assessed to understand how the workforce’s dominant unstated shared values and beliefs were influencing their behaviors and functioning.

Slide 9
Title: Adapting Performance Management
Review pages 6-11 of Assessing NASA's Safety Culture and the Central Role of Collaboration in Facilitating Relevant Organizational Change: (link to https://www.nasa.gov/pdf/57382main_culture_web.pdf ) and consider the assessments that were conducted on NASA’s culture.

Answer the following questions:

Question 1:

Describe the role of leadership in organizational culture on a change initiative:

[Student Entry]

Question 2:

Explain the main shortcoming of the recommendations for the change effort made by the Diaz team and the impact of this on the change effort:

[Student Entry]

Question 3:

The NASA report includes assessments and recommendations from several sources. What is one of the benefits of collaboration when assessing organizational culture for a change initiative?

[Student Entry]

Question 4:

Read “Five ways to drive collaborative change in your organisation.” (link to: https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/management/2017/07/31/five-ways-to-drive-collaborative-change-in-your-organisation/) Explain how collaboration relates to and plays a central role in several of the prerequisites for cultural change:

[Student Entry]

Slide 10
Title: Adapting Performance Management
Feedback

1. Leaders set the example in an organization about what is acceptable and valuable to the organization. Leaders influence others’ beliefs and behaviors by their actions, words, and the consequences they enforce.

2. The Diaz team did not conduct a sufficient cultural assessment. This meant they were unable to adequately identify and address NASA’s cultural issues, which were causing the safety problems.

3. One of the main benefits is that different points of view can be accessed. This means that a more holistic, accurate picture of the situation becomes evident.

4. As per the first prerequisite of the Culture Assessment, conveying sincere and complete information is necessary for cultural change as it is in collaboration. Collaboration also requires trust and follow-through, as per the second prerequisite for cultural change. As with the fourth prerequisite for cultural change, there must be motivation and a clear reason, goal, and outcome for collaboration. We can see that some of the key prerequisites of cultural change comprise the same facets of those of collaboration. This suggests that collaboration is key in how leaders create a culture that is ready for change and innovation.

Slide 11
Title: Final Submission
Return to your course in Blackboard where you will prepare a reflection post. Include responses to the questions below:

What competency do you feel is your strongest based on your work experience? Based on your work experiences, which competency would you like to improve upon? How could you improve on your weakest competency? What experience might help?